MAAFU. 241 



asked to assist in the feuds in which chiefs friendly 

 to them were engaged, receiving canoes and other pro- 

 perty in return for their services. From being mere 

 mercenaries, they gradually began to act on their own 

 responsibility, readily avenging every outrage from time 

 to time committed against any of their countrymen on 

 the smaller islands of the eastern group, where they 

 could calculate the exact number of their possible op- 

 ponents.* 



With the constantly increasing influx of Tongan 

 immigration, chiefs came over, who undertook the ma- 

 nagement of their countrymen, and among them Tui 

 Hala Fatai, mentioned by Mariner, and Tuboi Tutai, 

 spoken of as Tuboi Totai by Wilkes. About 1848, 

 Maafu, another of their chiefs, and destined to exer- 

 cise a vast influence on Fijian affairs, made his ap- 

 pearance. Married to one of the highest ladies of his 

 native country, descended from the ancient royal line 

 (Finau), gifted with great personal advantages, and 

 possessing as comprehensive and ambitious a mind as 

 rarely falls to the lot of a Polynesian, Maafu began to 

 prove a dangerous rival to King George, the chief 

 seated on the throne of his ancestors. He had already 

 shown his disposition in a sandal-wood expedition to 

 the New Hebrides, which originated with Messrs. Henry 

 and Scott. 



" About December, 1842, two vessels under British colours, 

 the ' Sophia ' and ' Sultana/ and a third which was said to have 

 carried the flag of Tahiti, arrived [at Tonga] to raise a party 

 for the purpose of forcibly cutting sandal-wood at the New 



* Compare Mariner's 'Tonga,' vol. i. p. 72-76. 



R 



